‘Mr Sweet? I’m DI Kirby,’ said the man outside. ‘And this is DI Anderson.’
Raymond pulled himself together and managed to say ‘hello’.
‘May we come in?’ asked the detective. ‘We have a few questions for you.’
‘Oh, erm, yes.’ Raymond stood aside as the two men entered the small room, then pushed the front door closed.
The three of them stood awkwardly in the centre of the room. Raymond had never had guests before – well, not like this – and he wasn’t sure how to conduct himself. He tried to think what Mrs Muir would do, but realised that he didn’t have any sherry, let alone those funny little glasses she used.
‘We’d like to speak to you about last night,’ said the one called Kirby. ‘Why don’t we sit down?’
‘Oh, erm, yes,’ said Raymond. He must stop saying ‘erm’, but before he knew it another one had popped out. ‘Erm, yes, sit down. There.’ He pointed at his old sofa. ‘I’ll perch.’ He’d heard Mrs Muir say that on several occasions. I’ll perch, dear. Somehow it didn’t sound the same when he said it.
‘Last night,’ the policeman began.
Last night. His mind began to race.
‘Could you tell us where you were?’ The second one, whose name he’d already forgotten, interrupted his thoughts.
‘Oh, I was at home,’ he replied, relieved at being asked such a simple question.
‘You mean here, in this building?’
‘Well . . . no . . .’ He looked nervously from one man to the other. The first one was looking around the room. His eyes were darting over everything, including some boxes in the corner, like a fly looking for something to land on. They lingered on the bedroom door, which thankfully he’d remembered to close, then eventually came to rest on Raymond.
‘Well . . . I, erm . . .’ He paused. Perhaps it was best to come clean. ‘I was playing cards with Leroy.’
The two detectives looked at each other and then back at him.
‘You played cards last night with Leroy Simmons, the security guard?’
He nodded, wondering why this was so interesting.
‘What time was this?’
‘I – I suppose it must have been about eight o’clock?’ Unlike his own clock, the one in the cabin ran on a battery and kept good time.
‘And what time did you leave?’ The man was making notes now in a shabby-looking black book, which Raymond quite liked the look of.
‘Quarter to eleven.’
‘And what time did you get back here?’ shabby-notebook man asked.
Raymond couldn’t be bothered to explain about his own clock, about how he kept forgetting to wind it, so made a guess. ‘Quarter to twelve?’
‘You were with Mr Simmons from 8 p.m. until 10.45 p.m., then walked back here arriving at 11.45 p.m.?’
‘Yes.’ He nodded, vigorously.
‘Can you explain how it took you an hour to get back? It can’t be much more than twenty min—’
‘Twenty-two minutes if I walk fast,’ he interrupted. ‘But I get chips on a Tuesday night from the Rock Bottom Fishcoteque. Sometimes they save me a piece of cod, or if I’m very lucky, a Peter’s Pie. Last night it was chicken.’
The two policemen were now staring at him intently, and he didn’t like it.
‘Have . . . have I said something wrong?’ Raymond asked.
‘So you left Mr Simmons at 10.45 p.m. and went to get chips? Which exit did you use?’ asked shabby-notebook man.
‘The main one on Battersea Fields Drive. It’s the only time I use it. Leroy lets me out.’
The second policeman, the one without the notebook, got up and pulled out his phone. ‘Excuse me,’ he said, and went outside.
‘And then what did you do,’ the first policeman went on, ‘after you got the chips?’
‘Peter’s Pie,’ corrected Raymond. ‘They’d run out of chips.’
‘Okay, so after you got the pie. What did you do then?’
‘I came home along Daylesford Road. And went to bed,’ he added, before being asked.
‘And you were alone?’
‘Well, yes . . .’ It was sort of true.
‘Did you see anything unusual, either on your way to the cabin or on your way back, last night?’ The policeman stood up and began wandering around the room. He stopped by the sink and looked up at Raymond’s kitchen shelf, where the tea and sugar were – and the urn.
‘No,’ he managed, his heart beating a little faster.
The policeman turned. ‘You didn’t see or hear anyone?’
Raymond shook his head again. He’d taken a small detour and strolled down to the lake – to walk off his pie – and seen the Creeper, but he didn’t think the police would want to know about ghosts. Plus, he wasn’t supposed to go down there and didn’t want Calder getting wind of the fact.
‘How long have you lived here, Mr Sweet?’ The policeman was now leaning on the sink, his arms folded, watching him from across the room.
‘A long time,’ replied Raymond, slightly confused by the change in subject. ‘I do have permission.’
‘So I understand. You can’t be pleased about the redevelopment.’
Raymond didn’t know what to say. Was this a trick? He couldn’t even tell if it was a question. ‘Has something happened?’ he asked tentatively. He still didn’t know why the policemen were here.
‘A body was found earlier; Leroy Simmons discovered it on his morning rounds. Do you know anything about it?’
‘Who – I mean, no . . .’ He was stunned. ‘Where?’ he managed to ask.
‘Keats Ward. By the lake.’
Something registered in Raymond’s subconscious, shadow-like, and then it was gone. His throat was suddenly dry and he wished the detective would move away from the sink so he could fetch some water.
‘Do you have any idea how a body might have got there?’
‘I . . . No, I don’t,’ he said, shaking his head. An uncomfortable feeling had come over him, and he felt his heart beating even faster.
‘Or why someone would leave a body there?’
He shook his head.
‘Have you been in Keats Ward recently yourself?’
‘No.’ He never went to that place. Ever.
‘Do you own a woman’s coat?’ the policeman asked suddenly.
‘Pardon?’ said Raymond, taken aback.
‘A woman’s coat. Only I thought I saw one through your bedroom window.’ The policeman was now staring at him with such intensity that Raymond felt his cheeks burning.
‘Oh, erm, yes, I suppose I do.’ What on earth did they want with his mother’s coat?
‘Would you mind showing it to me?’
It wasn’t a question, and Raymond eased himself off the armrest of the chair, relieved to get off his ‘perch’. Goodness knows how Mrs Muir managed it; she must wear padded underwear.
‘It’s in here,’ he said, leading the policeman into the bedroom. ‘There.’ He pointed. ‘It was my mother’s.’ The coat hung on an old anatomical model that he’d found in one of the basement storage areas. It made a very good clothes stand.